


Awake My Soul

by luckyfilbert



Series: Not With Haste [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-10
Updated: 2014-04-10
Packaged: 2018-01-18 21:56:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1444276
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luckyfilbert/pseuds/luckyfilbert
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A year after the events of Captain America: the Winter Soldier, Bucky finally feels ready to meet an old friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Awake My Soul

**Author's Note:**

> This has gotta be the sappiest little thing I've ever written, and then I titled it after a Mumford & Sons song to make it EVEN SAPPIER.

It's a sunny, perfect day at the National Mall, the breeze bringing just a hint of chill to the air. Bucky wishes it were cold, wishes for driving rain to pull all the cherry blossoms from the trees. He wouldn't have to worry about ruining a day like that.

"Are you sure we don't want to warn him?"

"Oh, I'm definitely sure," cracks Natasha with a grin Bucky doesn't entirely trust. He looks to Bruce.

"A little late now, isn't it?"

"Can't you--" Bucky gestures at Bruce's phone.

Bruce is considering a reply when Natasha steps in. "Look." She fixes Bucky with a look. "If I text Steve now and say I've got somebody for him to meet, he'll think it's Jessica from the cafe and he'll leave. If I say I've got _you_ for him to meet, he'll get awkward and nervous and this will be a lot less fun for me to watch."

Bucky frowns at her. She shrugs. "What? I didn't spend the last year cleaning you up just to watch the two of you shake hands."

"I don't . . ."

"Shht, go." Natasha actually spins him and gives him a little shove between the shoulder blades. Bucky catches a glimpse of Bruce's amused, indulgent expression. "That's where he runs."

He's looking down at the wide, open park around the Washington Monument. Bucky's been here before, but just once, and it was a while ago. Like everything in this time, it's a little busier, a little louder. But the water stretches out glassy smooth, looking far, far calmer than he feels.

He flexes his hands to calm himself. Last year, when he pulled that blonde stranger from the water, he'd thought he was done. Mission deliberately aborted, and all for some wide blue eyes and the feeling in his gut that this was wrong. But nothing had happened. No more orders, no more memory wipes. When Natasha picked him up at that exhibit, he'd been just beginning to let himself look for answers.

Natasha looked a little familiar too.

That was the first of the bad answers.

It wasn't easy. _Isn't_ easy. But between them, Natasha and Bruce know a lot about fighting demons. Bucky thinks he could spend a lifetime fighting his own, if he had something to fight for.

His eyes refocus as a figure rounds the pool and comes into view. There he is. There _he_ is. Running laps around the pool at speeds impossible to maintain. Steve used to run like that when they were kids, sprinting into every race. That Steve could go only a few yards before he collapsed, and Bucky soared ahead with the bitter taste of victory in his mouth. This Steve just keeps going.

He hasn't noticed Bucky yet, eyes fixed on the line of pavement in front of him, feet pounding him forward. Bucky watches him run. If he starts walking right as Steve rounds that corner, he should intercept him as he comes around again. He's planning their meeting like a soldier, he realizes. Like a combatant. The thought makes him smile, albeit a little sickly, and he makes himself walk forward.

He's mistimed it after all. Bucky reaches the water's edge just as Steve turns the far corner, and so tucks his hands under his arms, then into his pockets, watching Steve come closer. Watches him lift his eyes from the pavement and look across the pool at Bucky. Watches him stutter and stop.

There's no way Steve could recognize him across the entire length of the pool.

Bucky's mouth goes dry. His heart flops in his throat.

Steve starts moving.

Bucky's feet are rooted in place. He pulls them forward a step, stops. A few more steps. Steve is moving at a slower pace, stopping to look up at Bucky, as if to make sure he's still there. Still real.

Finally he reaches the corner, and they're facing each other now, and the look on Steve's face makes Bucky's chest hurt. He spent his entire life, all of their friendship, trying to make that look go away, and now it's here for him.

"Steve," he says, but his voice cuts out in the middle.

"Bucky," Steve breathes. It's a question.

Bucky nods.

Steve lets all his breath out in a shudder and manages a few steps toward him. They stare at each other for a minute, Bucky going over every familiar and yet unknown plane of Steve's face. Steve's throat bobs as he swallows. "How did you--?"

Questions are good. Bucky can answer questions. "Natasha," he says, turning to gesture toward them. "And Bruce. . ." he trails off as he realizes the hill where he left them is empty. But Steve is already nodding.

"I looked for you, but Natasha said you would come back in your own time. Or that you were dead." He gives a lopsided smile. "She doesn't like me interfering with her missions."

"You looked?" His voice lilts with a weak sort of hope.

"Yeah. Yeah." Steve's eyes are distant for a minute, but then he brings them back. "Bucky, when you fell--"

Those memories are still hazy, just a glimpse of Steve's anguished face and a lot of pain. "I can't--"

Steve catches his eye. "When you fell," he goes on, "I thought I should have fallen instead. It was my mission. And I--I couldn't, without you. That's why I crashed that plane into the ice--there were other ways out, but I thought, at least we'll go out together, we'll go out as heroes. And then they brought me back. And you were still gone." He's gotten close enough to reach out and grasp Bucky's elbow. "And I thought, I could have taken all this, except for you. It would have just been an adventure, if you. . ."

Bucky pulls a hand from his pocket to hold Steve's arm. "You could have managed it alone."

"I know." Seventy years and Steve still hasn't learned how to cry. "But I didn't want to have to."

It's that same expression on Steve's face, but this time Bucky can fix it. He gives a little tug, and Steve steps closer, and Bucky reaches out to wrap his arms around him. It's awkward at first, but then Steve deflates with a shuddering breath. He puts his arms around Bucky, pulling him closer. Bucky still isn't used to Steve being taller than him, but he buries his face in his shoulder and it's still Steve, still the same smell he remembers from school and sleepovers and war, finally shedding a few tears against the side of Bucky's neck. Bucky realizes his cheeks are damp as well. He holds Steve tighter and draws in a wavering breath.

"I'm going to be with you--"

Steve's voice is shaky but no less determined. "--till the end of the line."

**Author's Note:**

> I regret nothing. My love for this ship is as deep as the ravine where Bucky fell and as long as the years Steve spent without him. It will be with me till the end of the line. Unfortunately for my sanity.
> 
> I didn't pay a ton of attention to Bucky's speech patterns in CATFA and let's face it he doesn't give us a lot to work with in CATWS so I'm sure they're off . . . and I don't even know what Cap would sound like if he was properly emotionally compromised, so that's dodgy too. . . Just sappy traumatized old men in love okay.


End file.
